What if public transit was like Uber? A small city ended its bus service to find out::Small-scale, tech-based solutions to transportation problems have emerged as a great equalizer in the battle for infrastructure dollars between big cities and rural communities.
It doesn’t reduce the number of cars on the road. If anything, it increases it because they got rid of buses.
I see, yes that’s a good point, but I’d guess that’s not the goal of this program. Not sure if that’s a goal of any transportation agency, at least not that I’ve heard, but it should be.
Yeah, but busses actually consume quite a bit of fuel versus a smaller passenger vehicle, and in smaller towns running a regular bus that doesn’t have many or even any passengers might still be less environmentally sound, especially if they use an EV and charge between call-outs.
Even in my home town which is of decent size, the bus routes are super inefficient time-wise as they require a stop and transfer at the central station (making a trip take 1-2 hours) whereas taking the direct route up the highway is maybe 15m
Trolley buses are great, look them up.
Yeah I’m aware of trolley buses. Again, running the infrastructure for this versus independent electric vehicles for smaller populations or low-use areas doesn’t necessarily make sense
Yeah… except, if a city hasn’t been designed around supporting a trolly system, you’re not getting a trolly bus any time soon. You’re looking at years, potentially over a decade of work.